Texas Communities Welcome Strong Mercury Rule to Rein In Lignite Pollution

EPA rules package will clean dirty air and water for Texans near coal plants

April 25, 2024

Christine, Tex. - Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency finalized a package of four federal rules that will cut air and water pollution from power plants across the country. One of these rules, the updated Mercury and Air Toxics Standards (MATS), will have a particularly big impact on Texas communities near lignite-burning power plants because it will - for the first time - require these plants to follow the same mercury standards as other coal plants. Texas and North Dakota are the two main states that still burn lignite, a soft, brown rock that pollutes far more than black coal especially when it comes to mercury, which acts as a dangerous neurotoxin that can cause developmental delays, seizures, blindness, and additional significant symptoms.

According to 2023 EPA data, several of the nation's top mercury-polluting power plants are in Texas, including the lignite-burning San Miguel Power Plant in between San Antonio and Corpus Christi, Luminant's Martin Lake coal plant in East Texas, and NRG Energy's Limestone coal plant east of Waco. EPA estimates that remaining lignite plants across the country will have to reduce their mercury pollution - especially harmful to children and pregnant mothers - by 70% to meet the new standards, which will also require reduced hazardous air pollutants, including heavy metals like chromium and arsenic. Exposure to these substances can irritate the skin and lungs, harm our central nervous system, cause nausea and vomiting, and even lead to cancer.

All four EPA measures announced this morning are expected to save billions of dollars in nationwide health care and climate costs. With communities around the country feeling the impacts of generations of coal plant pollution, over one million people submitted public comments on proposals to strengthen these four federal standards.

Texas Plants Most Impacted By Rules Package:

• San Miguel coal plant, Atascosa County (South of San Antonio). According to 2023 EPA data, this is the fourth largest mercury polluter of all power plants in Texas and one of the top in the United States. It will have to improve its rate of mercury pollution reduction by approximately 92 percent. Despite the plant's involvement in water pollution concerns, ongoing lawsuits, and land degradation, the South Texas Electric Cooperative and its nine member co-ops across South Texas still purchase 20 percent of their power from San Miguel.
  
  The plant will also be required to remediate its coal ash sites as part of another revised rule announced today - the Coal Combustion Residuals (CCR) rule, which regulates pollution in groundwater from dirty coal ash disposal. San Miguel has two coal ash ponds with some of the most contaminated groundwater in the country, including cobalt that is 488 times what is considered a safe level. The new rule could require San Miguel to remove the ash that's sitting below the water level and install a lined impoundment for holding the ash waste.

  • "The San Miguel plant and its lignite mine have harmed our community and land for many years," said McMullen County Judge James Teal. "Neighbors are dealing with the operation's dirty coal ash ponds and terrible practice of carrying uncovered loads of lignite ash across important waterways. And we now know that San Miguel is one of the biggest mercury-polluting power plants in the entire United States. Armed with this new knowledge, it concerns me for all residents who could be exposed to mercury in the air, water, and soil. We welcome any opportunity for the plant to clean up its act. We may be a rural, sparsely populated area, but the people deserve to feel good about the air their kids are breathing and the water we're drinking."
    
  • "People in Three Rivers, downriver from the San Miguel lignite plant, are hardworking and love their families," said Three Rivers Mayor Felipe Martinez. "Unfortunately the playing field is so uneven between everyday people and the San Miguel lignite operation - one of the biggest mercury polluters of all power plants in the country. Something like this rule that can help level that, even just a little bit, is good news for the kids, the workers, and the families in Three Rivers."
    

• Martin Lake coal plant, Beckville (East Texas). This massive coal plant owned by Luminant once burned just Texas-mined lignite but now burns more Wyoming coal. Nonetheless, 2023 EPA data shows that it is still the second biggest mercury-polluting power plant in Texas and the third biggest in the entire nation. One reason is that Martin Lake has not installed a baghouse - a modern pollution control that can significantly reduce several pollutants including mercury and harmful particulate matter.
  
  Martin Lake, which sits on the edge of a popular fishing lake, will likely be required to remediate contaminated groundwater as a result of EPA's final CCR rule. Tests demonstrate that groundwater in the area surrounding its coal ash landfills is contaminated with concentrations of boron that have been measured at more than 20 times higher than safe levels. It is also a top emitter of climate-warming pollution and will be required to reduce these greenhouse gas emissions under the new carbon pollution standards.

  • "Despite burning less lignite over the years, Luminant's Martin Lake plant is still one of the biggest mercury polluters in the country yet people still fish and swim in the adjacent lake on a hot summer's day," said Misti O'Quinn, Sierra Club field organizer in East Texas. "Most people don't realize the real harm posed by plants that have 'been around as long as we can remember,' and that's why strong updates to these mercury and coal ash rules are so essential for protecting people as much as possible."
    

• Parish coal plant, Fort Bend County (near Houston). The Parish coal plant, owned by NRG Energy, will be affected by EPA's updated coal wastewater standards, called the Effluent Limitation Guidelines or ELGs, and will be required to eliminate several kinds of ash wastewater discharges.
  
  Parish will also be affected by EPA's CCR rule. Groundwater in the areas surrounding the coal ash landfill have levels of carcinogenic chromium that exceed health standards by as much as double and levels of the neurotoxin manganese that are as much as 14 times too high.

• Limestone coal plant, Jewett (east of Waco). Also owned by NRG Energy, this 30-year old coal plant will be subject to installing pollution control equipment or implementing pollution-control measures pertaining to all four rules announced in today's package. It once burned only lignite mined nearby and eight years ago transitioned to coal, yet remains a top polluter. The updated CCR rule will impact the Limestone plant, as groundwater monitoring shows elevated levels of boron, fluoride, and sulfate, and the facility has failed to monitor for other highly dangerous pollutants like arsenic, beryllium, and others.
  
  Under the updated ELGs rule, Limestone will also be required to eliminate discharges of harmful wastewater that percolates down through the facility's coal ash landfills and is collected and discharged into nearby streams.

Details on the Four EPA Rules Announced Today

• MATS: EPA released its first MATS in 2012, and the Clean Air Act requires the agency to periodically review - and, if necessary, strengthen - the standards to ensure that they are based on the latest available technology. Since its implementation, the 2012 MATS rule has led to huge reductions in pollutants like mercury, arsenic, and hydrochloric acid. This has reduced communities' exposure to mercury-contaminated fish as well as dirtier air and water, with mercury emissions from power plants declining by 70 percent between 2010 and 2020. But, until now, lignite plants were exempted from the MATS mercury standards and continued polluting much more than they should.
  
  The new standard will also require the use of Continuous Emissions Monitoring Systems, which are far more accurate than traditional air pollution tests and will better protect communities and increase transparency about the quality of their air.

• Coal Combustion Residuals (CCR) Rule: These updated standards will protect the public from millions of tons of toxic coal ash sitting in old landfills and ponds across the country previously exempt from federal regulations.
  
  The updates to federal standards for coal ash will regulate coal ash disposed of in old landfills and other fill areas at power plants, not just ash in "active" landfills. For the first time, the rule will also regulate the many coal ash ponds located at retired power plants, called legacy ponds.

• Carbon Pollution Standards: These final federal carbon pollution standards, issued under section 111 of the Clean Air Act, will control carbon emissions from new gas-fired power plants and existing coal-fired plants. Prior to now, there have been no federal limits at all on carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants and no meaningful limits for new sources.

• Effluent Limitations Guidelines (ELGs, coal wastewater standards): These updated standards will improve upon existing safeguards by requiring further reduction in toxic wastewater discharged by coal-fired power plants through cost-effective and readily available control technologies. These plants are among the largest sources of hazardous wastewater pollutants like arsenic and mercury in the nation.
  
  The final guidelines also eliminate toxic scrubber and bottom ash wastewater discharges and address sludge collected at the bottom of coal ash landfills, which is often held for years then released into nearby rivers.
  

About the Sierra Club

The Sierra Club is America's largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with millions of members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person's right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.

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